Busca by KB Conques

A perfect day for banana fish.  

QB is suffering.  Her asthma has flared up from the very hard walks in the heat.  She started the trip with a sore throat which is finally clearing but her check is congested and breathing is difficult. Add the heat and many hundreds of meters climbing a day and it has been really difficult.   Not the distances, but the grades and very poor path.  Even the Aussie bushwalkers have resorted to the roads on same days.  QB will do some road walking here.

My ride from Golinach was spectacular.  First a descent of 4 km dropping almost 400 meters.  Had to stop the bike many times to let the rims cool.   Dropped me into the town of Entraygues a lovely town situated on the river Lot in the Gorge du Lot.  Naturally very steep hills surrounding the  river road.   A perfect ride of another 30 Km to Conques on a small well paved surface with little traffic.  Rode extra slowly.  Had a good conversation with a Dutch woman, also on bike, riding the roads for fun; here on holiday.

A day of animals.  Stopped to take pictures of these lovely turkeys or small chickens but the farmer seem to think I was a fox and diapproved; moved on.   Farm with many burros, braying. Different cows and now horses being fed apples by another not so happy to be photographed farmer.

Staying at a camping site right on the river Dourdou a pretty tributary of the Lot.  All services.  Have a very small mobile cabin more like the back of van.  Comfortable and a nice change.   Not sure out dinner yet but we are just a large climb up a hill ( 100 meters above us is Conques) from this important historic city.

Instead of pictures and explanation strongly suggest you go to Wikipedia and look up the city of Conques.

Off to conquer the hill ascent to town.  Met QB and watched a wedding at the big cathedral – nice organ of course.  Clearly a high end wedding based on the way people were dressed and the amount of jewelry and Vuiton purses.   The priest or bishop, hard to know, spoke interminably about what the future couple must do and not do and how they are to honor etc etc.   Suspect by their ages that they have been living together for a decade or maybe a modern second marriage.

Obtained some food for dinner in the market at Conques.  They were speaking a variant of French I had trouble with so I asked if it was Langdoc     Nope, a local Patois, very local to Conques.

Some recent dishes:

-gazpacho soup served as a drink in a wine glass

– confit de canard

-confit de poulet

– oven roasted poulet

-incredible list of cheeses, far too many to remember

-a gateau de fraise – we shared it as we were too full for dessert but …….

– picture of someone making aligot at the market in Espalion.   No picture of the one making  a

giant paella.  Could smell the garlic from many stalls away.